Guido Fawkes: Plots, rumours and conspiracy

WHILE still denying it bankrupted the country, Labour does accept that, as a party, it is flat broke. Last week saw redundancy plans sent out to staff, which could see 10% of its 300 employees given redundancy payments. Guido understands it has had to take out a loan from the Co-op Bank in order to be able to finance the pay-offs. One Labour HQ worker told us: “It is really worrying if the Labour Party is having to borrow the money to make its own staff redundant. It’s unsettling for people and makes you wonder quite how they expect to ‘staff up’ for the election.”

Another figure missing from Wednesday’s Hunt fight was the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown

STAFF are angry about the downsizing, especially given that General Secretary Iain “David Brent” McNicol, promised last month that “200 new party organisers” would be “recruited by 2014 as part of a drive to build a stronger party at local level”. The sums don’t seem to add up but don’t panic, the bosses are trying to be nice. Apparently “any member of staff can request a union rep or friend to attend meetings between themselves and management that relate to the reorganisation and their role within the new structure”.

THE Lib Dems decided to abstain on last week’s crucial vote to decide whether Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt should face a sleaze inquiry over dealings with a lobbyist connected to Rupert Murdoch. The absent Coalition partners made the vote uncomfortably close for the Government. Tory MPs were called back to Westminster from across the world – one was forced to abandon his honeymoon and another was dragged from his hospital bed. There was a big surprise, though, when Hunt’s highest profile cheerleader on the backbenches – Louise Mensch – failed to show up and instead took her rock band manager husband to meet the Queen. One fellow MP complained: “The real test of loyalty isn’t when it coincides with a near insatiable thirst for publicity but when you are up for putting the team first.” The Government won but it was close.

ANOTHER figure missing from Wednesday’s Hunt fight was the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown who, despite being locked in a battle with the Murdochs, could not be bothered to turn up to vote. Gordon hasn’t shown up to speak for his constituents in Kirkcaldy since last November, yet still claims his £1,300-a-week MP’s salary. Local councillors would be automatically struck off by now if they hadn’t turned up to work for that long. After Brown’s bonkers turn at the Leveson Inquiry, where he denied on oath ever plotting to get rid of Tony Blair or briefing against his colleagues, Guido was surprised he didn’t make it to Thursday’s mental health debate...

ARMANDO Iannucci, the TV comedy writer who invented The Thick Of It’s Malcolm Tucker, has accepted an OBE. Alastair Campbell, upon whom Iannucci’s Tucker character is heavily based, was quick to put the boot in yesterday, tweeting that Iannucci had joined “the Establishment he claims to deride. Malcolm Tucker and I do not approve of honours system”. When Iannucci lamely retorted, Campbell hit back hard: “Three little letters can have more impact than you realise”. Iannucci tweeted straight back to the author of the dodgy Iraq dossier: “WMD”.